European Academy for Intellectual Entrepreneurs

The Lithuanian Free Market Institute runs the independent program - European Academy for Intellectual Entrepreneurs - for finding and training talented young people in Europe, to encourage undertaking innovative activities for principles of individual freedom, responsibility, free market and limited government. They invite those people who want to promote ideas of liberty to apply for funding. Up to USD 5000 per project will be provided. The application deadline is October 30th 2010.

Who is eligible for this grant?

We are looking for new intellectual entrepreneurs: individuals, groups, recently established organizations. We aim to support and strengthen the newcomers, encourage new activities or to expand existing projects, which would serve ideas of liberty in Europe, Caucasus and Central Asia.

Criteria for evaluation of application

Idea -25%. These criteria will assess how well the aims of your project correspond to the ideas of liberty.

Feasibility -25%. This criteria will assess how likely it is that you will achieve what you trying to achieve with your project. Here we shall look for realistic plans, sound expenses, reasonable timelines and other information that would convince us that you are really able to complete the project successfully.

Sustainability- 25%. These criteria will evaluate the likelihood that the project will continue in the future without the financial support of the Academy.

Impact -25%. These criteria will access the possible impact your project is going to have. We understand that the true impact of certain projects may be hard to foresee. Having this in mind we shall be very sympathetic during the evaluation.

Dates

Projects should start: December 1st 2010;

Application deadline: October 30th 2010;

Questions and Answers session with selected candidates: mid-November;

Duration of the project – up to 1 year.

Grant size

- up to USD 5000 per project;

o up to 80% from Academy;

o at least 20% from other sources

Project size

It is completely acceptable to create projects of various sizes: from very small to very big (e.g. from USD 100 to USD 1,000,000). But the Grant must not make up more than 80% of the total cost of the project. This means that if the total cost of the project for example is USD 2000, you can get up to USD 1600 from Academy; if your project is USD 200, you can get up to USD 160 Academy. If the total cost of the project is USD 12,000 you can get up to USD 5000 from Academy, because USD 5000 is the maximum grant available from the Academy for a single project. This means that you will have to find USD 7000 somewhere else.

Expenses

We provide financial support for the implementation of projects. Therefore the grant is designed to cover the expenses related to the project. When describing the amount of money necessary for the project please try to avoid incorporating expenses related to routine costs of running your organization. We strongly urge you to concentrate on the expenses related to the actual project.